In some types of electronic equipment used for interconnecting purposes, a plurality of slender, electrical contact pins formed with shoulders are inserted into apertures of a support, such as a printed wiring board, in closely spaced rows or arrays to form a back plane assembly. Edge board connectors of other printed wiring boards are ultimately mated with the back plane-supported pins which are referred to as in-board pins. Occasionally, during manufacturing assembly or in a field repair operation, one or more of the plurality of closely spaced pins which have been inserted into the apertures of the printed wiring board may be defective or become damaged and hence must be extracted and replaced with new replacement pins. Frequently, there are other structures other than the closely spaced, slender in-board pins in the area of the defective or damaged pin. It is important that defective pins be removed axially thereof to avoid any rotational or lateral movement of the pins within the apertures which could result in damage to the integrity of the apertures and the printed wiring board. Due to the close spacing of the slender pins, difficulty also arises in positioning a tool over the defective pins for removal thereof while avoiding damage to adjacent pins.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,028,790, which issued to J. M. Dupuis, discloses a tool which is insertable over and facilitates removal of connector pins extending from and soldered to a support panel. The tool includes a main body which is held in contact with a surface of the panel. The main body member includes an axially sliding gripping member having a split gripping portion which is moved by a tubular member surrounding the gripping member and which, on axial movement, forces the split gripping portion of the gripping member into firm frictional contact with the pin. Moreover, further axial movement of the tubular member moves the gripping member and the pin axially thereby shearing the solder joint and withdrawing the pin. A pivotally mounted, laterally extending handle facilitates the movement of the tubular member. While the tool disclosed in the Dupuis patent could be used to withdraw the pins disclosed therein, the structure of the Dupuis tool is very bulky and could not be used in removing closely-spaced, slender pins. Also, the actuating elements of the Dupuis tool extend laterally therefrom. With this arrangement, the manual operation of the tool would tend to pull the tool laterally of the axis thereof and thereby damage the adjacent, closely spaced slender pins.
Consequently, there exists a need for a tool which will remove shouldered pins from an array of closely spaced pins in a printed wiring board in a manufacturing environment as well as in a field operation. In addition, the tool must maintain a position coaxial with the pin being removed to avoid damage to adjacent in-board pins and to maintain the integrity of the apertures of the printed wiring board.